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Most small and midsize business (SMB) owners exist in a bubble of blissful ignorance. They focus on the day-to-day operations of their organization, driving growth, facilitating hiring and guiding marketing, without a single thought given to the security of the computer networks these processes depend on. After all, they’re just the little guy – why would hackers go to the trouble of penetrating their systems for the minuscule amount of data they store? And eventually, often after years of smooth sailing through calm seas, they get hacked, fork out thousands of dollars to malicious hackers and collapse beneath the weight of their own shortsightedness.

The facts don’t lie. According to Verizon’s annual Data Breach Investigations Report, a full 71% of cyber-attacks are aimed squarely at SMBs. And while it’s unclear exactly how many of these attacks are actually successful, with the sad state of most small businesses’ security protocols, it’s a safe bet that a good chunk of the attacks make it through. But why? As Tina Manzer writes for Educational Dealer, “Size becomes less of an issue than the security network … While larger enterprises typically have more data to steal, small businesses have less secure networks.” As a result, hackers can hook up automated strikes to lift data from thousands of small businesses at a time – the hit rate is that high.

Today, trusting the security of your company to your son-in-law, who assures you he “knows about computers,” isn’t enough. It takes constant vigilance, professional attention and, most of all, knowledge. Start here with the four most common ways hackers infiltrate hapless small businesses.

PHISHING E-MAILS

An employee receives an e-mail directly from your company’s billing company, urging them to fill out some “required” information before their paycheck can be finalized. Included in the very professional-looking e-mail is a link your employee needs to click to complete the process. But when they click the link, they aren’t redirected anywhere. Instead, a host of vicious malware floods their system, spreading to the entirety of your business network within seconds, and locks everyone out of their most precious data. In return, the hackers want thousands of dollars or they’ll delete everything.

It’s one of the oldest tricks in the hacker toolbox, but today it’s easier than ever for an attacker to gather key information and make a phishing e-mail look exactly like every other run-of-the-mill e-mail you receive each day. Train your employees to recognize these sneaky tactics, and put in safeguards in case someone messes up and clicks the malicious link.

BAD PASSWORDS

According to Inc.com contributing editor John Brandon, “With a $300 graphics card, a hacker can run 420 billion simple, lowercase, eight-character password combinations a minute.” What’s more, he says, “80% of cyber-attacks involve weak passwords,” yet despite this fact, “55% of people use one password for all logins.”

As a manager, you should be bothered by these statistics. There’s simply no excuse for using an easy-to-crack password, for you or your team. Instead, it’s a good idea to make a password out of four random common words, splicing in a few special characters for good measure. To check the strength of your password, type it into HowSecureIsMyPassword.net before you make it official.

MALWARE

As described above, malware is often delivered through a shady phishing e-mail, but it’s not the only way it can wreak havoc on your system. An infected website (such as those you visit when you misspell sites like Facebook.com, a technique called “typosquatting”), a USB drive loaded with viruses or even an application can bring vicious software into your world without you even realizing it. In the past, an antivirus software was all that you needed. These days, it’s likely that you need a combination of software systems to combat these threats. These tools are not typically very expensive to put in place, especially considering the security holes they plug in your network.

SOCIAL ENGINEERING

As fallible as computers may be, they’ve got nothing on people. Sometimes hackers don’t need to touch a keyboard at all to break through your defenses: they can simply masquerade as you to a support team in order to get the team to activate a password reset. It’s easier than you think, and requires carefully watching what information you put on the Internet – don’t put the answers to your security questions out there for all to see.

We’ve outlined some of the simplest ways to defend yourself against these shady techniques, but honestly, the best way is to bring on a company that constantly keeps your system updated with the most cutting-edge security, is ready at a moment’s notice to protect you in a crisis, and can train your end-users. Hackers are going to come for you, but if you’ve done everything you can to prepare, your business will be safe. To discuss how Keller Schroeder can help you develop a comprehensive strategy to protect your business, contact your Keller Schroeder Account Manager today.

We are excited to announce our second quarter “Partnering Together In Business & Community Giveback” $500 donation recipient is Alive Hospice, nominated by Maria Conatser from Ingram Barge Company. Maria was recently joined at Ingram’s offices by Keller Schroeder’s Select Account Manager Lee Barron and Alive Hospice’s Judy Orr and Taylor Thurston to accept the donation. Thank you for partnering with us in giving Maria!

Keller Schroeder’s recent efforts to create relationships with new clients and prospects has extended an opportunity to partner with us, both in business and also in giving back to our community. Each quarter, we are holding a drawing for a $500 donation to a United Way-approved organization nominated by a prospective client we have recently met with.

Keller Schroeder is excited to announce the opening of our Nashville, TN office at 901 Woodland Street. The East Nashville office is the first hub outside of Evansville for Keller Schroeder since our founding in 1978.

Keller Schroeder has solid partnerships with Nashville-based businesses and technology partners. We have successfully supported a number of them from Evansville for several years. Our Nashville team has worked hard to gel with the local business and tech communities in Nashville, as well as the community at large. We’re excited about the message the opening of this office sends to our clients, partners, and prospects in Nashville. We know the close proximity will be a welcome benefit to them and to our team that serves them regularly.

As an employee-owned organization, Keller Schroeder exists to make positive, personal impacts on our employee-owners, clients, and the communities we serve. We’ve made positive impacts on many businesses in Nashville through our work. Through volunteering and giving back, we’ve impacted a number of community organizations in the region just as we have in Evansville. We are humbled by how we have been welcomed by the business leaders in Nashville, and are expecting great things to come out of our expansion there.

As 2017 winds to a close and the holiday season is upon us, it becomes easy to get wrapped up in a frenetic pace of gift-buying, party-attending, and filling every minute of available time with “required” activities. Instead of giving in to the pressures of that type of schedule, I encourage you to give yourself the gift of some quiet time filled with reflection on what is most important to you and how you can ensure those relationships get priority. These moments of self-awareness can reduce stress and provide clarity and perspective that greatly increase your enjoyment of a season to be filled with celebration and joy.

At Keller Schroeder, we strongly believe the purpose of our organization is to provide positive, personal impacts in all of our interactions. Our desire is to make those impacts on our employee-owners, our business partners, and the communities where we work. It is a blessing to have had so many opportunities to serve you in that manner in 2017. We truly value our relationships with the businesses and community organizations where we work, and we look forward to additional opportunities to make even greater positive, personal impacts in 2018 and beyond.

Merry Christmas to you and your loved ones. If Christmas is not a holiday you observe, we wish you a season full of joy, grace, and peacefulness.

Keller Schroeder was recently certified as a great workplace by the independent analysts at Great Place to Work®. Keller Schroeder earned this credential based on extensive ratings provided by its employees in anonymous surveys. A summary of these ratings can be found at http://reviews.greatplacetowork.com/keller-schroeder1.

“We applaud Keller Schroeder for seeking certification and releasing its employees’ feedback,” said Kim Peters, Executive Vice President of Great Place to Work’s Certification Program. “These ratings measure its capacity to earn its own employees’ trust and create a great workplace – critical metrics that anyone considering working for or doing business with Keller Schroeder should take into account as an indicator of high performance.”

“According to our study, 95 percent of Keller Schroeder employees say it is a great workplace,” says Sarah Lewis-Kulin, Vice President of Great Place to Work Certification & List Production.

About Great Place to Work®

Great Place to Work® is the global authority on high-trust, high-performance workplace cultures. Through proprietary assessment tools, advisory services, and certification programs, including Best Workplaces lists and workplace reviews, Great Place to Work® provides the benchmarks, framework, and expertise needed to create, sustain, and recognize outstanding workplace cultures. In the United States, Great Place to Work® produces the annual Fortune “100 Best Companies to Work For®” list and a series of Great Place to Work® Best Workplaces lists including lists for Millennials, Women, Diversity, Small and Medium Companies and over a half dozen different industry lists.

Since its official conception in 1997, the standardized group of technologies commonly known as Wi-Fi have greatly evolved to meet changing business needs and environmental demands. The use cases for wireless networking have grown exponentially from the basic data services of the late 90’s. Below is a list of needs that today’s wireless solutions commonly seek to fulfill.

Data Services

Just as with the original 802.11 standard, today’s current amendment of 802.11ac allows for data services. However, the similarities end there. Historically, perhaps the most significant hurdle with migrating data services to wireless technologies has been the severe limitations of wireless connectivity speeds, in comparison to speeds of wired devices. The recent amendment of 802.11ac promises to significantly narrow the gap between the technologies. The 802.11ac theoretical speeds of over 1Gbps dwarf the speeds of earlier amendments. The vertical markets now being targeted by wireless technology manufacturers are virtually endless.

VoWIFI

Voice services over Wi-Fi (VoWIFI) have been brought to the forefront of the use cases for wireless over the past decade. Aided by the adaptation of VOIP technologies, enterprises of all sizes can now offer support for mobile devices within a geographical area using unlicensed radio frequency bands. IEEE and Wi-Fi Alliance publications have also provisioned means by which to integrate robust wired networking feature sets such as Quality-of-Service (QoS), Network Access Control, multicast routing support, and Power Save with these devices. These advancements allow a fully-converged and collaborative network to extend beyond the wires.

Location-Based Services

Location-based services such as RFID, GPS, and asset tracking systems have been brought into the spotlight in many vertical markets. These technologies allow real-time tracking, reporting, and analysis of wireless devices throughout a property or facility. Manufacturing, distribution, and physical plant management groups now use technologies such as Wi-Fi to aid in obtaining the location of infrastructure and assets. Many times, data generated from a wireless location service can be fed to other analytical applications, creating a more streamlined and meaningful business process.

Ptp and Backhaul

Though less common than other applications, the practice of leveraging Wi-Fi technologies for use as site-to-site links is a perfect fit for some business needs. Often, such as when bridging between two physical locations, the cost of extending networks via wireless equipment proves to be far less than the cost of installing buried or aerial cabling. With the advent of 802.11 amendments such as “n” and “ac”, speeds and resiliency equivalent to wired Ethernet can be achieved.

Overall, wireless technologies have never been more prevalent than they are today. With recent amendments by the IEEE and the Wi-Fi Alliance, speeds of modern wireless networks often approach or surpass those of wired Ethernet. Wireless technologies have also gained traction in environments with mobility and location needs. Additionally, wireless technologies can offer resiliency and redundancy that meets or surpasses the redundancy seen on wired Ethernet networks, often at a fraction of the cost.

Keller Schroeder offers full solutions centered on wireless technologies from multiple manufacturers. Our company also performs comprehensive pre-installation and post-installation site surveys, using industry-leading tool sets. To learn more about how Keller Schroeder’s wireless offerings can help meet your business needs, contact your Keller Schroeder Account Manager.

Do you typically have an annual physical for your personal health? You should do the same for the health of your website. While it may not seem critical, your website is often the first impression of your business and you want to be sure your visitors have a good first experience.

User Habits Have Changed

Think about how many people you see on a given day using their phones or tablets to search the web. Unlike five or ten years ago when everyone would wait to search the information when they got to work or home, most people today will access the information immediately from a restaurant, meeting, game, etc. The number of people doing mobile searches increases every year.

Note: If your website is more than a few years old, pay close attention to the following sections.

Responsive Design

Think about your website—can you see everything on a mobile device without having to scroll to the right? “Responsive design” is important today. There are two simple ways to tell if your website is responsive. One is to access the site from your smartphone browser. Another way is to shrink the size of your desktop browser window. Do your menu options scrunch up into the hamburger menu so the limited screen space is used wisely? Do the panels and boxes wrap or do you have to scroll over to see content? Does the text wrap around the images correctly? Not only does it matter to your visitors, it matters to Google. The search giant gives preference to sites that have a good mobile experience.

Content Is King….Still

In Bill Gates’ 1996 “Content is King” essay he stated, “Content is where I expect much of the real money will be made on the internet…” He was talking about both the text on the screen and the software that serves it up. Another point he made back in 1996, and still true today, is there are “broad opportunities for most companies…” and that “no company is too small to participate.”

More small business have websites, often collaborating with other websites to expand their reach. Think about how a website with Search Engine Optimization (SEO) capabilities can help a business reach thousands more potential customers locally, nationally, and internationally. Is your website content still relevant? Is it still correctly stating what your business’ services and capabilities are? Are the images even from this decade? Keep in mind, the better the content, the more likely a search engine will pick it up.

How’s Your Google Ranking?

Google Ranking is where you rank when someone is searching for your website with a search engine. You may be wondering why Google Ranking would be important, but think about how most people look for something. They go to their favorite search engine and try locating the information based on “keywords”. If your site is buried at the bottom of page 1, or several pages deep, what are the odds that a potential customer will find your site?

Here are a few of the things that can affect your ranking with the Google’s search engine.

Above-The-Fold – When Google looks at your website, they pay close attention to what is above the fold and use that to index your site. This is the area presented on the screen space before scrolling. You need to be sure this area is filled with meaningful content and keywords, and not ads.

Popups – While these were popular several years ago, they are no longer in favor. Author Barry Smith confirms, “Google has started to penalize sites with those annoying pop-ups, starting with mobile websites.”

Links – Another way to help in your ranking is to link other pages in your own site, as well as other websites. If you go to another site, the key here is to make sure you are linking to sites that are current and frequently update their content as well.

Frequency of Updates – It is important to consistently post information to your website. One good way to promote your site is by blogging. Many people use a blog format for their news page, and that works just fine.

Another way to help your ranking is to update your content. In the article by Cyrus Shepard from MOZ, “changing a single sentence won’t have as big of a freshness impact as a large change to the main body text.” He also states, “Content that changes more often is scored differently than content that only changes every few years.” The article also states, “Websites that add new pages at a higher rate may earn a higher freshness score than sites that add content less frequently.” When was the last time your content was refreshed?

Keywords – Also important are the “keywords” that are used in the content, images, etc. Think about how you want to find something in a browser. What special “keywords” would you use to find something? Now think about your website– if you don’t have those keywords on your site in content, blogs, and so forth, how can you expect the search engines to find your site?

Bounce Rate – Think about how long someone might stay on your website? If your site is cluttered, has a bunch of popups, annoying videos that start automatically, or they don’t see what they want above the fold, then they will probably get frustrated and leave the site. Believe it or not, this is tracked. According to an article from Granite5, “A high bounce rate is an obvious sign of an outdated or poorly performing site. Website users usually leave a site hurriedly without visiting other pages simply because they don’t find what they are looking for instantly or do not like the look of it!”

Load Rate – The same is true for how fast your site loads. If the site loads slowly or plugins are missing, the user will not feel welcomed or important and leave your site.

As microchips have reduced in size and yet increased in performance, so have the requirements for a website. While “Content Is King”, it is important to take full advantage of what is available to make the site load quickly and efficiently. Whether speed is gained by a combination of compressing images, compression or streaming of videos, or coding to match up with the latest techniques, websites should be reviewed on a regular basis.

Social Signals – According to an article from Search Engine Journal, “there is an extremely high correlation between social signals and ranking position. Facebook is still the network with the highest weighted social signals.”

SSL – Years ago, most websites didn’t use an SSL encryption unless they wanted to verify and protect the information going over the internet. Search engines, like Google, are now adding that into their algorithm for ranking websites.

How SSL Affects Your Ranking With Google

At a conference I attended this past fall, it was stated that Google ranks sites with SSL certificates higher. In a 2016 Google article from the Chrome Security Team, it states two conditions that took effect in January 2017. If an unsecure site collects either passwords or credit card information, then the sites will warn users that the sites are “not secure”. (You may have noticed recently the “Secure” / “Not secure” icon in the URL bar.) Google is taking this even further with their HTTPS Everywhere initiative.

In the future, Google plans to “label all HTTP pages as non-secure, and change the HTTP security indicator to the red triangle that we use for broken HTTPS.”

Font

In an article titled “5 Signs Your Website Needs A Refresh” by Michael Burton, the author points out that “A few years ago it was the norm to have a lot of fancy graphics and imagery on your website, but the web has moved on to more of a flat design which relies more on color than images.” Besides color, the font on the screens can say a lot about your site.

In a recent article titled “7 Elements of Modern Web Design”, the author states “Online, sans-serif rules readability. In print, we see serif fonts as more readable. If you want to get fancy with your fonts, save it for larger headings. It will still have the same impact without blinding your users.” He goes on to mention that the font size is important to readability. “12pt used to be fairly standard, but that is being bumped into the 16pt range more frequently…” In a recent article titled “17 Tips to Create Content 10x Better Than Your Competitors”, author Ramona Sukhari mentions to make the fonts bigger. “On average, pages ranking #1 had 15.8pt font.”

I was asked recently to speak to a group of college students about lessons learned from my 35 years in the marketplace. As you can imagine, narrowing 35 years of experience down to a 30-minute talk was fairly challenging, but one of the topics I chose for these students – and a factor that has contributed significantly to our success at Keller Schroeder – is what I refer to as ownership thinking.

Keller Schroeder has been employee-owned for 13 years through an ESOP (Employee Stock Ownership Plan), but ownership thinking has little to do with who actually holds the stock certificates. There are lots of people who own companies, in full or in part, who do not practice ownership thinking. And, there are lots of people who have never owned a share of stock in a company who are pros at ownership thinking.

Ownership thinking is about choosing to believe – and it is a choice – that you have the most to do with your path and your destination – not your circumstances, and not the actions of others. Psychologists refer to it as a strong “internal locus of control”. Students who practice ownership thinking will blame themselves, not their teacher, for a poor outcome on an exam. Leaders who practice ownership thinking will focus on shaping the future and influencing outcomes rather than reporting on the past or justifying underperformance. Conversely, individuals who tend toward an “external locus of control” are quick to blame others or environmental factors for their misfortunes.

What is your bias? Do you “own it”, look for solutions, and take action? And would you agree that those who do so are far more pleasant to live with and work around than those who don’t? Doesn’t it stand to reason that those who practice ownership thinking perform at a higher level and achieve more than those whose default is to look beyond their sphere of influence to explain most of what happens to them?

You and I as individuals can strengthen our tendency toward ownership thinking by surrounding ourselves with those who have a strong internal locus of control – those who habitually believe and act as though their own actions are more important than the hand they have been dealt. As leaders, we can build a bias in our organizations toward ownership thinking by rewarding action and initiative over justification and deflection.

There are always environmental factors and circumstantial contributors to what we see and experience in business and in life, but if we choose to own, act and move, rather than blame, dwell and wait, we exponentially increase our chances for success.

On Friday, October 7th, 2016, Keller Schroeder hosted our annual Client Appreciation Event. This year, we wanted to again honor the true superheroes in our organization, our fantastic group of clients. With a theme of “Superheroes Unite,” it was a day filled with a delicious lunch from Marx Barbecue and dessert from the Pacetre, plus fellowship, fantastic prizes, and a lot of fun. Our prizes this year included a Bose Home Theater System, an Apple Series 2 Watch, fun superhero gear, Yeti tumblers, gift cards, a more!

Perhaps our favorite aspect of this event every year is the opportunity we give our clients and employee-owners to give back to the community. The continued generosity shown at this event never ceases to amaze us. This year, The Lampion Center was chosen to receive our give back donations. We successfully collected over 2 truckloads of supplies for the organization – things like cleaning supplies, office supplies, Daniel Tiger DVDs, and new equipment to aid the Lampion Center’s therapists during their sessions.

Thank you so much to all of our employee-owners for their hard work in making this event a reality every year. We also greatly appreciation our vendor partners for both their resources and for joining us. Most importantly, we owe a huge debt of gratitude to our clients for their continued loyalty and support. Be sure to mark your calendars for next year’s Client Appreciation Event! It’s always the first Friday in October – October 6th in 2017!

Keller Schroeder’s President Larry May will serve as the 2016 Executive in Residence for the University of Southern Indiana’s Romain College of Business. His presentation, titled “The Value of Ownership and Running Shoes,” will be presented at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, October 5, in Carter Hall in University Center West. The presentation is free and open to the public.

The primary purpose of the Executive-in-Residence program is to provide opportunities for students to gain insights into the business world and into the thoughts and lives of business executives. This year is the 44th year for the program at USI.

Larry May led Keller Schroeder’s transition from its founding owners to an Employee Stock Ownership Plan structure in 2004, fostering a highly-engaged ownership culture that serves more than 200 clients and 85 employee-owners. Prior to Keller Schroeder, he held technical and leadership positions in IT and human resources with Bristol-Myers Squibb. He earned a bachelor’s degree in computer systems management and a master’s degree in business administration from Murray State University.

May has been a resident of Evansville for 35 years and currently serves as the chairman of the board of United Way of Southwestern Indiana. He also serves as a Court Appointed Special Advocate for children (CASA) volunteer for Vanderburgh County. May has served as chairman of the IT Alliance advisory board for the Romain College of Business at USI.

May resides in Evansville with his wife Tammie. They have three children daughter Diana; son, Travis; and daughter, Carly, who is a CPA and recent accounting graduate of USI.